Stevie Goldsmith had mentioned that Aboriginal people were used as slaves back in the day. I decided to take it upon myself and learn more about it, since I had never been told that before. The more I learnt from Stevies lecture the more I became infuriated that I had not been taught this in school. I think it is important for us to learn about our own history not only to acknowledge the wrong done to the Indigenous people of our land but also to learn from it.


In Northern Australia Aboriginal workers had no wages on cattle stations, Aboriginal workers were valuable to the cattle stations so to me it does not make sense why they were not paid, it is not enough for them to only have a few advantages.

An article, The Cattle Industry by Heather Douglas has stated even when they were paid sometimes they were kept in accounts held by station owners. Also in the 1950s stations that wanted to hire Aboriginal workers had to retain a license pursuant to the Aboriginal Ordinance.(1) It was only in 1966 that a man Vincent Lingiari led the way to strike for better wages and conditions at Wave Hill cattle station.(2) Years of waiting it was in 1975 when the Prime Minister of Australia, Gough Whitlam poured sand into Vincent Lingiari's hand symbolising a part of the land in Wattie Creek rightfully being transferred back to the Gurindi people.(3)

The symbol of pouring sand into Vincents hand is beautiful but I wish it never had to come to that, Australian land will always be that of Indigenous people.


Reference
(1,2) Douglas, H. The Cattle Industry, 2009
http://www.law.uq.edu.au/documents/kriewaldt/The-Cattle-Industry.pdf
(3) Documenting a Democracy http://foundingdocs.gov.au/enlargement-eid-73-pid-50.html